Photography by Danielle Levitt
Andraka is a prodigy if there ever was one. While many of his peers were trying to remember the difference between mitosis and meiosis, the 16-year-old wunderkind was developing a revolutionary new test for detecting pancreatic cancer in its early stages. Andraka's cancer-detecting method is faster and cheaper than the method currently held as the gold standard, and it won him the 2012 Gordon E. Moore Award, the grand prize at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. Though he's always dreamed of being a scientist, the world's full of possibilities for the young genius. "I really have no clue where I want to go or what I want to be when I grow up," says Andraka. "I still have a lot of decisions to make."
Photographed at the Plaza Hotel in New York City on September 12, 2013
